


The Flow of the Force

by crossingwinter



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Star Wars Setting, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-22
Updated: 2015-01-22
Packaged: 2018-03-08 14:11:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3212063
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crossingwinter/pseuds/crossingwinter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>A Jedi feels the Force in different ways.</em> That was what Syrio Forel had told her when she had been so small she had hardly come up to his waist. <em>What matters is that you feel it. Calm as still water, now, Padawan.</em> </p>
<p>
  <em>I do not feel it, Syrio.</em>
</p>
<p><em>I do not feel it.</em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Flow of the Force

**Author's Note:**

  * For [meli_fan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/meli_fan/gifts).



_A Jedi feels the Force in different ways._ That was what Syrio Forel had told her when she had been so small she had hardly come up to his waist. _What matters is that you feel it. Calm as still water, now, Padawan._

_I do not feel it, Syrio._

_I do not feel it._

You couldn't lose the Force, could you? Surely not. And yet when Arya reached out for it, it was not there, no flow through her body, her soul, her fingertips. She was Arya Stark, Master H'ghar had said that she was a fount of the Force, that the Force was so strong with her that she would surely be on the Council of Masters one day. _A girl must not desire it. A girl must not aspire to it. A girl must be humble, for what she has is a gift._

And it was gone. 

She looked no different now than she did before—still long of face and grey of eye with her hair cropped to her skull with a strong braid dangling along the right side of her face. But she couldn't even make her fork cross the table towards her outstretched hand. 

She was supposed to have shed it all. Death was a part of life, and death came to everyone in the end. She was sad to have lost Syrio, but this emptiness inside her...

They took the Padawan learners away from their families young for just this reason, so that if you were present for your father's execution, you were not wholly devastated by it. Sad—that was to be expected, for the loss of life is always a sadness, even where it is inevitable.  But as much as she had revered Syrio his death was not the one that made the Force leave her body.

She was Arya Stark. Her planet was Winterfell. And her father was dead. Her father, who had kissed her forehead and called her beautiful, who had told her long before the Jedi Knights had come for her that death was not the only form of justice, just the easiest. 

And with her father dead, feelings flooded through her—her brother Jon who had ruffled her hair (when she had had it) and shown her how first to fire a blaster; Bran who had climbed anything that stood still long enough before a fall had taken his legs but not his life; Robb who had always done his best to emulate their father and who was fighting still, who had raised a host of fighters to harry the Lannister trade vessels; Rickon who might well stand taller than her now; her mother who had held her close and smiled, and even Sansa and her songs. She wondered if Sansa had lost her songs as Arya had lost the Force, if her mother could still smile, if Rickon didn't stand a little less tall, if Bran dragged himself from his bed, and if Robb and Jon hardened their hearts as they prepared to fire.

A part of her wanted nothing more than to go to them, to cry and mourn with them, but she was afraid that if she went she would never return to complete her training. She was afraid if she stayed, she would never feel the Force ever again. And she knew well that fear led to anger, anger led to hate, hate led to suffering.

_I must not be afraid. I must not. I am trained in the ways of the Jedi Knights._

And somewhere, more fleeting, in the back of her mind,

_I am a direwolf of Winterfell._

* * *

She meditated everyday, even if she could no longer feel it. She let her mind go blank, let herself hear her own breath, and tried to let it all fall away. She was Arya Stark, and when she meditated, she could not hear the sigh of the crowd as Payne had sliced off her father's head in her own breathing--she would not let herself.

"You shouldn't scowl when you meditate." She had heard that voice before, but that did not mean she expected it. She opened her eyes to see Gendry there. They had been friends before Beric Dondarrion had taken him to train far away. They had laughed together and trained together, even though he had been older than her—nearly twice her age when they’d first met. He’d gone away though, his Master taking him to the other side of the galaxy and Arya hadn’t seen him since.  He still wore a Padawan’s braid, even though by now he was much older than any other Padawan she knew. He should be a Knight by now.

She wondered when he had come back. It was just the two of them and he was watching her and she felt, without intending it, her scowl deepen.

"I know that." It still stung though, being corrected. How many hours had she spent with Syrio, while he coaxed her into her first meditation?

"I know," Gendry said. His voice was calm. Arya felt a pang in her throat. Once, her voice had been calm like that.

He closed his eyes and began to breathe, and Arya watched him for a moment, the way his face went blank, went empty, and she closed her own eyes and tried to do the same.

* * *

 

Once, they might have tested her to see if she was ready for Knighthood, but she knew that Master H'ghar could see she was not ready. She wondered if he knew that she had lost the Force. No one seemed to know. No one except Gendry.

"You can't feel it anymore, can you?" he asked her quietly one afternoon. She had been meditating again, meditating because she did not wish to drill if she could not feel the Force guiding her body such that her light saber arced to block and parry and protect without her needing to think. There was training, and there was inflicting suffering upon herself, and she suffered enough already.

_Shed your suffering,_ she thought in Syrio's voice, _shed your suffering, shed your hate, shed your fear. Only then will you find balance again._

_What if I cannot?_

_You will. You always do._ It was her father's voice now. She wanted to cry. She had not felt so young, so small, in years.

"No," she said. "I cannot."

Gendry nodded at her, and there was pity in his eyes, pity and understanding.

"Have you ever...?"

He shook his head. "I have not."

She felt hot shame bubble in her. She should feel no jealousy, should feel no bitterness that the oldest Padawan of them all had never once lost the Force. No one had. No one except those whose paths turned them away. Even the Sith could still feel the Force, even if it was the dark side of the Force.

"It took me long to find it, though," Gendry said, and she stared at him. He was trying to help her, she could see that much and before she could stop herself, she found herself blurting out the question.

"Why?"

He breathed slowly, his eyes never leaving hers. "I was full of rage," he said but judging from his voice she would never have been able to tell. "I was angry and alone. I felt...darkness. Anger feeds the dark side of the Force, and I was too full of it to know that was what I felt." She remembered him, as she had first met him, constantly glowering and snapping at any who crossed him. When had he turned into this calm man seated across from her?

"How did you shed your anger?" she asked him, and he smiled sadly.

"Time. Hard work." He wasn't telling her something. He was blushing, and she wondered what it was, but did not ask.

_There is a difference between looking and seeing._

But she could not see what it was, only how blue his eyes were, and how strong his jaw was. His hands were peaceful on his knees and his back was straight and tall.

* * *

 

It was different with Gendry than it was with the others. Gendry had always been different than the rest, in a way that Arya had not understood when she was nine years old. She understood it now, though.

Gendry had known loss too—the loss of his mother, the loss of his home, the loss of his first Master, Tobho Mott, who had been slain during a skirmish in the outer rims.  Gendry had known worthlessness, and he had known fear. It was a different sort of fear than Arya knew now, but powerful all the same, and he had nearly walked the road.

Too often, Arya realized, you heard stories of Jedi who fell, who became Sith warriors. Never, she realized, did she hear stories of those who pulled themselves up, who fought those who would drag them down because there was some small kernel of faith in them.

Gendry had had faith once. Faith in himself when the galaxy had denied him at every turn, and that was all he had needed.

She wondered if Gendry had faith in her. Arya wondered if she had faith in herself.

* * *

 

"A girl and a boy will go," said Master H'ghar. He said it benignly enough, and Arya felt a thrill of panic run through her, even as Gendry inclined his head.

"Alone?" Arya blurted. She heard Master Mann tsk at her, but her eyes were locked on Master H'ghar.

"A girl and a boy will go alone. A girl and a boy will look after one another. A girl and a boy do not have Jedi Masters, and so will work together—neither the student nor the Master."

_There is always a Master,_ Arya thought. Syrio had told her so. _Even when you are old like me, you never stop learning. True mastery is a myth. The only true Master is the Force itself._

_I am without a Master then._

Arya chewed her lip.

_I will not be afraid._

They flew out that night, her and Gendry in a trade vessel bound for Riverrun, where they were to protect a trade caravan that was being harried by Lannister assailants. And try as she might to distract herself, she could not. She was Masterless, faithless, fatherless. She should not be here—she should be home with her brothers and mother and sister.

Gendry sat down beside her with a tray of food for them to share. "You are not alone," he told her, as if he had heard her thoughts. "And if you leave now, all you will have accomplished will be for nothing."

"What have I accomplished?" she muttered bitterly, reaching for a roll and chomping into it.

Gendry's smile was small, and not fleeting but almost insubstantial. "You have accomplished me," he said quietly. Arya's eyes went round, and she paused in her chewing to gape at him.

Gendry's smile grew and he reached across the table to close her bread-filled mouth for her, and Arya felt a jolt run through her at the touch of his fingers.

"Syrio Forel would be appalled at your tablemanners."

"Syrio Forel wouldn't care," she snapped at him. Only Septa Mordane and her tsks of displeasure had ever cared about Arya's table manners. She hadn't thought about Septa Mordane in years. She wondered if she was still alive, or if the war had swallowed her as well.

Gendry snorted, then he sighed. "You have done wonders, Arya Stark, even if you do not remember them. You will do more yet."

* * *

"What did you mean—I accomplished you?" she asked quietly.

She wasn't sure if he was still awake.

He was, and she heard him sigh.

"You were my friend," he said simply. "I had never had friends—not real friends, anyway. And I needed a friend. And there you were. I would never have listened to Beric if it weren't for you.  I wouldn't have trusted him, and I would have slid to the dark side.  You didn't let that happen. And you didn't even know."

Arya was still.

_You have done wonders,_ he had said. Would he truly have fallen? The Force was so strong with him, and he was calm—hardly the roiling bull of a boy she had once known. Had she done that, as much as Beric Dondarrion?

_I must have, for him to have such faith in me._

* * *

It was during the fourth day of their guard that the caravan they were bringing from the Red Fork to the Tumblestone was ambushed, just as the riverrunners had feared. Gendry leapt into action, his saber glowing green in his hand and swirling it as easily as if it were a leaf in the wind. He bounced blasts back at their assailants and Arya wondered what it would have been like if his saber were red and if he wore black.

It was an alien image, so unlike Gendry. Gendry who for all his anger, had always had a smile for her, even when she’d been young. Gendry, who had faith in her when Arya did not have faith in herself.

She wanted to scream, she wanted to fight—she _should_ fight.  She knew how to fight. But it wasn’t just knowing how to fight, it was being the fight, feeling the Force and _knowing_ what was and what wasn’t and how to make others cease and bend to your will before you were forced to break them. That was what Arya had known, what Arya had been.  That was the Arya that had helped Gendry when she hadn’t even known she was helping him, the Arya who had been a fount of the Force for if she knew one thing, she knew _herself_ —knew that she was a direwolf and when the fight found the direwolf, the direwolf didn’t cower in the corner.  The direwolf didn’t flee when things were hard, it rose, it overcame, and if she was a direwolf then she could feel it, she could, she could be what she was, be what she was meant to be if she just—if she just—

And she did.  Arya felt her own lightsaber jump to her hand, a brilliant blue erupting from the hilt.  She stepped forward and it was as though everything stood still for this—this was how it was supposed to be, this was how it was.  Arya felt a familiar warmth in her hands and a moment later she was dancing, dodging, deflecting, as if she were the swirling water of the river.

For the first time in months, she felt as though she could truly breathe again.

* * *

Gendry was knighted upon their return, his Padawan braid snipped from behind his ear, and Arya could feel her own heart swell with pride at the sight of it. He was flowing with pride, with achievement, with accomplishment and Arya basked in it. 

She was not knighted, though she knew it wouldn't be long. The Force was strong in her, but her faith had been shaken and she must let herself continue to heal. 

She would heal. She knew that much. She would heal and maybe she would even fight in the war, I'd the Masters thought it would not test her faith. She would heal, she would grow strong—she had faith in herself. 


End file.
